News:
Academic highlights

Rachel Hyman is the first holder of the Richard Norman Scholarship. Rachel visited Dorothy Norman to thank her personally for the generous benefaction. The Richard Norman Scholarship Fund has been established by Mrs Dorothy Norman in memory of her late husband. The scholarship fund is for the benefit of postgraduate students in the Department of Engineering undertaking research in electrical engineering.

For those who were not awake at the crack of dawn, the brief feature on holograms on BBC Radio Cambrigshire's Dotty McLeod Breakfast Show can be experienced via the BBC iPlayer. The feature was part of a series celebrating the fact that as of 2015 the film 'Back to the Future' is no longer referring to the future any more. This begs the question, were any of the things Marty McFly experienced on his epic journey through time a real prediction of here and now. The item appears 1:49:40 into the Breakfast Show and is asking if 'Jaws 19' really could be seen in holographic 3D today.

A paper recently published in Applied Optics by Eric (Fan Yang) has been selected to feature as the cover image for that issue. Eric's paper - Fast precalculated triangular mesh algorithm for 3D binary computer-generated holograms - demonstrates a new technique for rapid 3D hologram generation. This new triangular mesh system greatly enhances the hologram design process and allows for better GPU acceleration using standard CUDA based graphics cards.

A paper recently published in PNAS by Yunuen Montelongo and colleagues of the CMMPE group has demonstrated, for the first time, a two colour hologram patterned in plasmonic silver nano rods (or antennae). The rods were fabricated on the nanometre scale using ebeam lithography. The dimensions of rods determines which wavelength of light can be used to excite a surface plasmonic resonance. This resonance is then used to diffract the light into a pre-determined image. In this device, two separate holograms were encoded using two different lengths of nano-rod, giving separate holofraphic replay images depending on the wavelength of the illumination.

The CMMPE Group was very well represented at this years BLCS annual meeting in Durham. Aside from the usual drinking and socialising, there were some excellent papers and posters given as part of a very stimulating conference line up. The meeting was ample proof that there is still a vibrant and diverse liquid crystal community within the UK. Subjects spanning theory to experiment from twist bend phases to Flynn's (CMMPE alumni) classic paper on the true diversity of chiral materials still waiting to be discovered.

The CMMPE attendees were also showered with much deserved acolades:

The best student presentation prize went to Rachel Hyman for her work ‘Polarisation independent phase-modulation of light using polymer-stabilised blue phase liquid crystals’ which is a major step forward in finding an elusive high speed phase modulation material.

The poster prize was won by Calum Williams for his epic ‘Tunable multifunctional nanostructured holograms using liquid crystals’ which shows the true diversity of different mechanisms that can be harnessed through liquid crystals.

The BBC World Technology service has featured Dr Damian Gardiner's startup company
illumink as part of its feature article 'Next Silicon Valleys: Why Cambridge is a start-up city'.

ilumink is a spin-out company from the Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge. The company was founded by key members of the research team along with highly experienced commercial personnel.
Commercialisation was kickstarted by funding from the Royal Academy of Engineering Enterprise Fellowship Scheme for Dr Damian Gardiner.

Andrzej's passion for physics and
computer science has led him to his true love: holography. Having received a BSc in Physics and Computer Science at King’s College London and
Master’s at the University of Cambridge, Andrzej is currently pursuing a PhD at Cambridge, his mission: to create a new generation of 3D displays.

Recent
research on devitrite-based optical diffusers by CMMPE group member
Dr Haider Butt in collaboration with the Materials Science Department
the has been featured in the Research Highlights section of Nature.

Recent
research has been published on holographic sensor technology by CMMPE
group members in collaboration with the Department Department of Chemical
Engineering and Biotechnology, Cavendish and The Children's Hospital
of the Kings Daughters. Smart holograms, which are
currently being tested to monitor diabetes, and could be used to monitor
a wide range of medical and environmental conditions in future, have
been developed.

Near-field
diffraction of a simple circularly symmetric pattern of arcs displayed
on a ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulator by a helium
neon laser imaged directly onto a sensor without any lens after diffraction.
The triangular pattern observed to exceed the boundaries of the central
circle are due to interference fringes in the intermediary diffraction
pattern. NOTE: There are three images attached of different exposures.

Collaborative
reserarch, carrried out by the Optoelectronics
Group, CMMPE, and the EPEC
Group, on a hybird photonic-crystal/liquid-crystal laser device
is featured on the front cover of this week's Applied Physics Letters.

These
awards are presented by the Association
of British Turkish Academics (ABTA) to promote and award scientific
excellence among young researchers in the UK. Haider was selected amongst
the three finalists of Engineering and Physical Sciences category from
a total of applications 140
received from 40 universities in the UK. At the award ceremony the three
finalists presented their research to a general audience. Haider was
awarded first place in the competition for his research work on 'Holograms
based on Nanostructures'. The award consisted of a cash prize and tablet
PC.

Damian
has recently commenced his prestigious Enterprise Fellowship -awarded
by the Royal Academy of Engineering - to commercialise recent technology
pioneered in CMMPE.

The
global cost of counterfeit products - from fake banknotes to pharmaceuticals
and consumer products - is estimated at £500 billion. Using the
breakthroughs in printable liquid crystal laser technology and liquid
crystal lasers, Damian will develop his work on unique optical signatures
combined with scalable print processing to provide security features
and devices which could help prevent the sale of counterfeit goods.
Damian aims to establish a spin-out company to bring this technology
to market with support from his colleagues in CMMPE and the Inkjet Research
Centre as well as Cambridge Enterprise.

A recent
paper by CMMPE researchers on the applications of carbon nanotubes for
holography has been reported on several popular science news websites,
and also by the University of Cambridge Research News pages.

A paper
by CMMPE researchers, recently published in Advanced Optical Materials,
has been highlighted by the editor, Dave Flanagan, as a "bright
idea". The article describes a technique for constructing Fresnel
lens arrays and other holographic structures using patterened forests
of carbon nanotubes.

The Royal
Academy of Engineering (RAE) awarded Damian, Philip and Stephen
runners-up prize for the ERA
Foundation Award 2012, "in recognition of outstanding entrepreneurial
research in the field of electro-technology". They were awarded
a certificate at the Academy
Awards Dinner, at the Royal Opera House in London, for their work
on COSMOS Lasers and the commercialisation of liquid crystal laser technology.

19/06/12

Haider Butt
awarded Henslow Research Fellowship

Many congratulations
to Haider Butt, who has been awarded with a stipendiary Henslow Research
Fellowship from Wolfson College, Cambridge.

The
Hamilton
Prize is awarded by the University of Cambridge to a graduate student
submitting the best report embodying research carried out in the University
on the theory or practice of the physics or engineering of any aspect
of communication, propagation, or signal processing, associated with
electromagnetic radiation or wave propagation. Congratulations to Joel,
who won the prize for 2011.

At their
recent annual meeting and conference, held in Strathclyde (1-4 April,
2012), the British Liquid
Crystal Society (BLCS)
awarded the prize for best poster presentation to Philip
Hands. Phil's poster, "Compact, inexpensive and widely-tuneable
liquid crystal lasers" also featured a live demonstration
of the COSMOS tuneable liquid crystal laser.

The Technology
Focus of the March
2012 edition of Electro Optics features a full-page article all
about the tuneable liquid crystal lasers research currently being undertaken
at CMMPE as part of the COSMOS TT project. The article also features
an interview with Philip Hands, describing
the recently constructed COSMOS laser demonstrator unit and the technology
upon which it is based.

Flynn Castles
awarded PhD Prize for "Outstanding Dissertation"

The Department
of Engineering has awarded Flynn Castles
a prize for his "outstanding dissertation". His PhD thesis,
"Highly flexoelectric liquid crystals" was carried
out at CMMPE under the supervision of Prof. Harry Coles. After submitting
in September 2010, and graduating in May 2011, Flynn now continues his
excellent research as a postdoc within the group.

Harry
has been invited to be the plenary speaker at the Organic
Photonics & Electronics symposium, at this year's SPIE Optics
& Photonics conference. The lecture is on Wed 15 August 2012, at
the San Diego Convention Centre, and will be titled, "Coherent
and Random Liquid Crystal Lasers".

The SID
'12 Technical Program Committee has invited Harry to give the Invited
Address to the 2012
International Symposium in Boston, to be held between June 3-8,
2012. His lecture will be titled, "Ultrafast High Optical Contrast
Flexoelectric Displays for Video Frame Rates".

19/02/12

Philip
Hands and Harry Coles interviewed by "The Naked Scientists"
for live BBC Radio

The award-winning
BBC radio show "The
Naked Scientists" invited Philip
Hands and Harry Coles into the studio
to take part in their focus show on lasers. They were interviewed about
recent research developments by the team on the COSMOS projects. They
were asked how liquid crystals can be used to make compact tuneable
lasers, which the team are commercialising for applications such as
portable medical diagnostics. There was also a live demonstration of
liquid crystal tuneable laser technology. The show was broadcast live
on 19th February, 2012, to several BBC local radio stations, including
BBC Cambridgeshire, Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk, Northants, and is also
available to download as a podcast/mp3.

Dr. Tim Wilkinson
"under the microscope"

The University
of Cambridge research webpages feature a video by Tim Wilkinson, "Under
the microscope", explaining how his research combining nanotechnology
and liquid crystals is helping to develop new generations of 2D and
3D displays.

Dr. Tim Wilkinson
appears on BBC Radio 4

A Christmas
Eve broadcast on BBC Radio 4, titled "Jack
and the Genetically Modified Beanstalk", featured CMMPE's very
own Tim Wilkinson. The show featured academic expert guests who helped
separate fantasy from reality in this famous fairy-tale.

File no
longer available

16/12/11

Harry Coles
gives series of invited lectures to Taiwan liquid crystal research community

Prof. Harry
Coles was recently invited to Taiwan, where he gave a series of prestiguous
invited talks (details below), including the plenary lecture to the
Taiwan Liquid Crystal Society.

COSMOS
Lasers presents at Meerkats & Avatars media event

CMMPE researchers,
Philip Hands and Damian Gardiner, exhibited the COSMOS liquid crystal
laser demonstrator today at a marketing and PR event called Meerkats
and Avatars, held at the St John's Innovation Centre, Cambridge. The
event was attended by numerous local investers, entreprenuers and media,
and marked the first public exhibition of COSMOS Lasers. It is planned
that COSMOS Lasers will soon become a spin-out company, based upon the
EPSRC-funded COSMOS and COSMOS TT research projects being undertaken
at CMMPE.

The July
2011 edition (Vol.36) of the MRS Bulletin highlighted notable papers
at the MRS Fall Meeting. On page 4 (symposium L), it highlights CMMPE
research, presented by Harry as a "notable paper" of interest.
The paper describes an overview of the recent liquid crystal research
undertaken within the group, including high efficiency lasers, and fast-switching
displays.

Katie
Atkinson attended the Merck CASE Conference, held in Southampton
earlier this month, where she presented her results from her PhD studies
so far to her industrial sponsors. The title of her talk was "Structure-property
correlations in bimesogenic liquid crystals for the flexoelectro-optic
effect". Congratulations to Katie, who, in reward of her excellent
work, was awarded the prize for the best first year oral presentation.

Whilst
attending the Saudi International Electronics, Communications and Photonics
Conference (SIECPC) in Riyadh (April 23-26, 2011), Haider
Butt was awarded with a trophy for the best paper at the conference.
His work titled "Optical waveguides and switches based on periodic
arrays of carbon nanotubes" stood out as having the highest
overall ranking and also the best paper in the Photonics track. Many
congratulations to him.

In recognition
of his academic success and receipt of the BLCS Young Scientist of the
Year award 2010, Steve Morris was recently
interviewed about his career in an article by Nature magazine. The article
is part of their Nature Jobs supplement, and features in Nature
467, p.239, (2010).

A recent
CMMPE publication has been highlighted by the Journal Club for Condensed
Matter Physics. The organisation publishes a monthly selection of "interesting
papers in condensed matter physics by distinguished corrsepondents",
and discusses their findings in a public forum.

Tim
Wilkinson has recently been asked to become a topical editor for
the OSA journal, Applied Optics. His area of editorial specialism covers
displays, liquid crystals and reconfigurable photonic materials.

A
grant of £15,000 has been awarded to CMMPE researchers for their
recent proposal for funds to the CamBridgeSens
network. The proposal was led by PhD student Ranjith
R, and concerns the development of a flat nano 3D vision sensor.
He is supported also by his supervisor, Timothy
Wilkinson, along with fellow CMMPE members Philip
Hands, Christoph Bay, Jon
Freeman, Qing Dai, and also Hai Duong
from the Department of Materials Science.

EPSRC
recently announced the award of funds to a Cambridge team led by Prof.
Harry Coles, for a two-year Technology
Translation project, starting December 2010. The grant aims to build
upon the excellent research carried out during the COSMOS
Basic Technology Grant, which comes to an end in November 2010.
Collaborative investiagtors on the grant include Dr.
Tim Willkinson (also CMMPE), Prof. Sir Richard Friend (Cavendish
Lab) and Professor Ian White (Dept. of Engineering).

Researchers
at CMMPE have proposed a theory of liquid crystal
Blue Phases, stable over an unusually large temperature range. The
paper, published this week in Physical
Review Letters, provides a theoretical understanding of previous
discoveries (featured in a letter
to Nature by CMMPE authors in 2005), and suggests how further stability
may be achieved through "molecular engineering".

A
recent CMMPE publication by Rick Chen and Tim Wilkinson has been selected
as the front cover art for the latest edition of the journal Applied
Optics. The cover art features images from a point-based computer generated
hologram algorithm, which uses a Gaussian interpolation kernel to create
a continuous surface representation from discrete input points. The
kernel width controls the final appearance of the reconstructed three-dimensional
image as shown. For more details, the full paper can be viewed here:

A
recently accepted research article, led by Su
Seok Choi, has been accepted for publication by Advanced Materials,
and has also been chosen for the inside front cover art for the October
19th edition (and special Cambridge University 800th Anniversary edition)
of the journal. The full article reference can be found below:

Dr. Tim Wilkinson
is promoted to Reader

Many
congratulations to Tim Wilkinson who has
just been promoted by the University from Senior Lecturer to Reader.
We hope that he will still remember his old friends now he has been
elevated to such lofty ranks(!)

The
April 2009 edition of the SID's publication "Information Display"
previews the forthcoming SID symposium, "Display Week 2009".
On page 17, it highlights CMMPE research, to be presented by Flynn
Castles, as a "notable paper" of interest. The paper describes
some of the modelling work from his PhD (supervised by Harry
Coles) on the flexoelectro-optic effect,
and how it can provide a fast switching mechanism suitable for use in
field-sequential, color, full-motion video displays.

The SPIE
Newsroom pages (23rd April, 2009) feature an article highlighting recent
CMMPE research. The research, carried out by Dr.
Damian Gardiner, Dr. Stephen Morris
and Prof. Harry Coles, demonstrates
how novel smectic-A materials can be used for low power consumption,
high efficiency, multi-stable smart windows/glazing. The news report
is in response to a recent publication on the same subject, published
in Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells.

The
April 2009 edition of Nature Photonics features an "out of the
lab" news article focussing upon liquid crystal lasers research.
It highlights CMPPE's research on simultaneous red, green & blue
polychromatic liquid crystal laser arrays, and represents the 2nd occasion
that Nature Photonics has highlighted CMMPE's LC lasers research. Furthermore,
the Cambridge University Engineering Department's website front-page
currently features a news article highlighting the same research. These
news articles are in addition to the recent article in Laser Focus World
(see CMMPE news item 09/01/09), which also highlights the same work.

Several
CMMPE group members recently attended the annual meeting of the British
Liquid Crystal Society (BLCS), held at HP Labs in Bristol (6-8 April,
2009). Congratulations to Damian, who
surprised and defied his critics when he was awarded a prize for the
best overall poster, with his presentation on hybrid electroluminescent
/ PDLC displays. To view all the posters presented by CMMPE members,
please see the CMMPE conference publications
page.

Congratulations
to CMMPE PhD student, Ranjith R.,
who is an award winner in the CamBridgeSens
Innovation Competition. His joint research proposal with three other
Engineering students titled "A Road to Chemical Nano-Diodes (CNDs)
and Biochemical Nano-Photo Diodes (BNPDs)" has won him and his
co-authors funding for future research.

More
information on CMMPE's research into holography
and hybrid LC carbon nanotube devices can
be found here. The original publication in Advanced Materials upon which
the articles are based can also be found below:

In
their January 2009 edition, the international scientific magazine, Laser
Focus World, published an article highlighting recent research carried
out by members of CMMPE on polychromatic liquid crystal laser arrays.
It details how this technology shows promise for use in developing low-cost,
high-performance laser displays. Click
here for the Laser focus World article. Alternatively, the original
publication in Optics
Express (October 2008) is detailed below:

The
results to the 2008 national Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) have
been announced, and place Cambridge University Engineering Department
as the highest performing General Engineering department in the UK.
90% of its research is stated to be either "internationally excellent"
or "world-leading", and far surpasses its nearest rivals.
For the full story, see here.
Or to see the RAE results directly, see here.

The
latest edition of Nature Photonics
(Oct. 2008, Vol.2, Iss.10) features a "News and Views" article,
which summarises the recent LC2CAM conference (Boulder, USA, August
2008); an international workshop on "Light-Controlled Liquid Crystalline
Complex Adaptive Materials". The article highlights CMMPE work
that was presented by Harry Coles and
Philip Hands at this meeting. Click above
to download a pdf of the article.

26/09/08

CMMPE
presents its research to International Visiting Committee

An
international visiting committe comprising of leading scientists and
prestigious representatives from funding bodies and investors visited
the Engineering Department today. They attended oral and poster presentations
from the division, including presentations and demonstrations by CMMPE
group members. Click below to download copies of these posters:

The
Pilkington Prizes are awarded each year by the University of Cambirdge
to academic or academic-related staff who have distinguished themselves
in teaching. Congratulations to Tim for
winning this award, who "has a natural gift for teaching and
delivers his courses with clarity and with humour." Click
above link for full story.

The
COSMOS Research
Showcase Event took place today. It was widely attended by academics,
insdustrial representatives and the EPSRC, and has received generous
positive feedback. Congratulations and thank you to all CMMPE members
for their efforts in helping to make this event such a sucess.